Guitarist Joe Stump (HOLYHELL, REIGN OF TERROR) is featured in a new interview with Norway's Metal Express Radio. An excerpt is available below:

MER: How have your practice sessions changed over the years, beginning with your days as a young guitarist just starting out, your student years, your band years including your solo work, and lastly any free time you might have had when not involved in any type of project/album?

Stump: "Cool question. I’ve always loved to play and enjoy practicing. On the road everybody’s got their laptop out looking for a wireless connection and I’m over in the corner of the dressing room playing away. In my younger days, I played continuously 6-8 hours a day at least and that continued on when I was gearing up for my early solo recordings. I still practice all the time -- at least 3 to 5 hours a day when I’ve got a day off. And at Berklee, I’m there 3 full days a week (when I’m not touring) with a guitar in my hands playing and teaching high tech shred/speed metal anywhere from 6-10 hours/day. I feel very blessed that I spend every day doing what I love and I’m always trying to improve as a player and overall musician."

MER: How much different is it for you to be in a band such as HolyHell where lyrics play an integral role as opposed to your solo career that has been more Instrumental in nature? Is there a different approach you take as far writing, playing, or recording music when lyrics are involved?

Stump: "Well, in addition to the HolyHell stuff, I’ve also released four vocal records with my own band, Joe Stump’s Reign of Terror, so I do have quite a bit of experience composing band/vocal material. With my thing whether it’s solo or the Reign of Terror stuff, I compose all the music. But HolyHell has several people involved in writing for the band. On the debut record some of the tracks are mine while a good portion of the stuff is written by Francisco Palomo. He’s the keyboard player for HolyHell and he’s a tremendous all around musician and a monster player, just stupidly fucking good. His stuff is more melodic and epic while mine’s heavier and more evil sounding so it’s a great balance material-wise. Maria Breon (HolyHell vocalist) writes all the lyrics and Joey DeMaio (MANOWAR bassist, power metal pioneer/kingpin) produced the HolyHell record and he’s heavily involved in developing the tunes, from contributing writing ideas, arrangement ideas, sounds, everything."

Go to this location for the complete interview.